The size medium and other nonsense

Ah yes, Firehouse Subs: the only sandwich shop to promote fire safety while simultaneously leaving one toasting sandwich unattended in order to put toppings on another… Yes this is the joy that is Firehouse.

Now when a sandwich is tasty, there are a lot of things I am willing to overlook. For example, Firehouse once took 20 minutes to make my sandwich. 20 minutes to put turkey and cheese between two slices of bread. Firemen are out the door in 30 seconds tops, and Firehouse is just getting the twisty tie off the loaf.

But I was willing to look past that.

And they always give me a pickle when I don’t ask for a pickle. And to me, pickle is to cucumber as the remake of Footloose is to the original, a sad reminder of the phrase: “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”. So yeah, not a pickles fan.

But I was willing to look past that.

But THIS, this I just can’t overlook… *removes free plastic fireman hat and demands to be taken seriously*

Every time they ask me what size sandwich I would like, I say small. And every time, I get the same response:

“We don’t have a small. We have a medium or a large.”

I’m sorry, what? You don’t have a small? But you have a medium? How does that even make sense?

Medium means middle. It’s a middle ground. You can’t have a medium if you don’t have a small. It doesn’t work that way. Eliminate one of the three and medium immediately goes away. It’s just the way the English language works.

Firehouse isn’t the only place that *ignites* my frustration (HAH) with their sizing.

Here’s the thing: I go in there a lot wanting just a little sip of something. So I say, “Small.” And they say, “Tall?” No, not tall. Small. My drink does not need to be tall. In fact, it needs to be quite short because I WANT A SMALL. I don’t need to be racking my brain trying to come up with your silly little names, most of which aren’t even in English. It’s like you walk into Starbucks, and you’re no longer in the US; you’re in some parallel universe where you are foolish to even assume that English is spoken. How silly of me. I thought I was in AMERICA.

The barista gives me this doe-eyed, little-kid-on-Christmas-day look, like why won’t you just play along with our fun little game, but I will tell you why: because it’s not fun. It’s annoying.

And don’t even get me started on the Coldstone “Like It”, “Love It”, “Gotta Have It”. No one wants to be pigeonholed into that kind of a description. Why do they assume my choice of size reflects my appreciation for their ice cream? What if I “love it”, but I just had a big lunch? Or what if my friend and I want to share a bowl? Must we be made to sound as desperate as the girls who have “gotta have it”?

There’s a system for a reason, folks.

SMALL *OPTIONAL MEDIUM* LARGE

Get creative with advertising all you want, but when it comes to ordering, I mean business.